


Name Me Defeat

by gehddit



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: First Time, M/M, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-01
Updated: 2018-05-01
Packaged: 2019-04-30 13:03:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14497572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gehddit/pseuds/gehddit
Summary: INFINITY WAR SPOILERS!!!!!!!! DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN!!!!!!!!Takes place pretty much immediately after Infinity War.Turns out Loki isn't quite as dead as he may have lead on and Thor doesn't quite cope.Healthy dose of angst, not that any of need it after that frigging movie :)





	Name Me Defeat

**Author's Note:**

> This was written veeeerrry quickly and with zero beta, so feedback is much appreciated :) 
> 
> Let's all get through this year to Infinity War 2 together

  To have lost.  Truly lost like no other hit he’s taken.  Losing his mother, but regaining his brother.  Losing his planet, but saving his people. It was all a price to pay. And now what?  What victory can he take from this defeat?

  Thor was hunched over his knees, not even the comfort of Stark’s top of the line relaxing him as the bed takes all of his weight.  Everyone had dispersed to their own private rooms upon their return to headquarters

 _“Rest.”_ Rogers had said, as though they could. As though any of them would even be able to close their eyes.  

  “For someone so over burdened with confidence you have accepted defeat rather easily, wouldn’t you say?”

  Thor has never been so still. Rage wars with a sharp and all consuming relief that is quickly stamped out by Loki’s next words.

  “No warm words of greeting for your long dead brother?”

   His transition from utter immobility to lethal speed has both of them reeling.  Loki would never have had time to dodge Thor’s hold and now could not hope to have the strength to escape it.  Slamming him against the nearest wall, satisfaction skitters across Thor’s skin at the breath forced from Loki’s lungs.  The solid feel of his brother beneath his clenched hands. The racing heart beat. The undeniable _life_.

   Loki’s hands are up in surrender, his eyes a newly unshuttered twist of uncertainty and… _understanding_ . Thor cannot think. Cannot _breathe_.  That Loki could have known what this would do to him, that he knew and still he-- Thor roars, bringing Loki somehow closer just to slam him back against the wall again. There’s a grunt of pain, and flicker of irritation clearly forced from Loki’s expression with a patience born of change.

   “I am here brother. It was as I am, a figment.  You have nothing to fear.” It was spoken like a vow.  A vow Thor knew all too well he could not keep. He could not call this anger now. Not rage.  Those fill him, empower him, give him strength. This could not be rage for he has never felt so empty.  So weak. And that Loki cannot see this, cannot see the power he wields, steeps him in a dread that has him shaking.

   “And what of when it is real!? What of when you are truly rent from this world!? What then!? _What will become of me then!?”_ The scream takes him slack to his knees, head resting on Loki’s stomach in a perfect picture of the exact future he has described.

    _Broken_

   Thor utterly broken, ripping all the nine realms to shreds in search of him.  In search of anything to prove it had again been a lie. A trick. That his ever reliably unreliable brother would find his way back.  Immortality spent waiting.

  Loki feels his head moving back and forth, eyes searching for Thor’s as he finds himself crouched in front of him, unaware of having made the decision to do so. This is panic he is feeling, unfamiliar and unwanted, and it has him reaching for his brother.  Thor knocks is hand away only for Loki to bring it back with a snarl. It lands on the back of Thor’s neck, and it is the familiarity of the gesture having been so unexpectedly reversed that snatches his eyes to Loki’s.

   “No.”  Loki has yet to regain control and it is not said by choice, but that only makes him believe the word all the more.  “ _No_.” That would not be Thor’s fate.  He would not let it.

   “What other future have you left me with?” 

  “You are more than that.  You _must_ be more than that.”

   “Do you think me invincible?  The one pain I cannot bear, you have given leave to reign over me again and again.  How much of this do you expect me to take? To survive?”

   A sneer rips across Loki’s face, his voice now rough with venom, “You will survive all of it.  You will bear every weight I should choose to let fall upon your brutish shoulders.”

   “Why are you doing this to me?” All his conviction lost, all his strength dried to dust. Has he ever sounded so hopeless?

   Loki’s grip on Thor softens some, less punishing.

  “Because it is who we are Thor. And it will always hurt.”

   His shoulders sag with the truth of this. A truth forced upon him. Perhaps by his brother or the fates themselves, he could not tell.  Was sometimes unsure if there was a difference. And in the end it did not matter. _This_ would be his defeat.  Heavier than Hela, greater than Thanos.  Here is where he cannot move. What did Stark call it?  

   Checkmate.

    _“Don’t.”_  Loki’s voice has returned to its desperate lilt and it forces Thor’s eyes back to his burning blue. “Do not break beneath this.  It will always hurt--” a breath seems to steady him, but his cool cracks under the pressure of this admission-- “but I will _never leave_.” So sure.  He is so sure and for the first time in their disconsolate history Thor is envious of his brother, squeezing his eyes shut against the feeling.

   “How can you promise me that?”

   “Look at me.” Loki’s grip tightens again when he does not comply.  “ _Look at me you mawkish fool_.” The viciousness of his tone, the normalcy of it, pulls Thor back to him. “Name a force in this realm or any other that could rend me from you.”  He presses forward, his forehead to Thor’s, forward and forward. Always seen as trying to move past Thor, when all he ever wanted is to push through him.  Bury himself beneath his brother’s skin.

    _“Loki.”_ Thor has him by his hair now, pulling with Loki’s push as though he has heard his brother’s thoughts

   “Show them brother.  Show them all where I belong.” Thor is shaking his head, brushing his nose against Loki’s.  He doesn’t understand what Loki is asking him to do. He can’t. “Show them _who_ I belong to.”

   A groan rips through Thor’s chest and he has them on the ground, Loki tight beneath him, covered by every part of him.  

   This is staking a claim, nothing more.  A claim he has carried through eons. He has at last found a way to leave his mark.  Before he’s even touched Loki, Thor has ripped his green, black garb to shreds. Taking in his brother bare beneath him, he finally understands. This was what he could never quite name. Never quite put a finger on.  Centuries spent wondering why they were always so at odds and in a single moment he’s found his answer.

   But what breaks him now, as it always does, are his brother’s words.

    _“Thor, please.”_ And there is nothing else to be done.

   His mouth meets Loki’s in a clatter of teeth and sting of blood, a fight as much as anything else between them.  Loki’s fingers tangle in his hair, Thor’s hands raking down Loki’s ribs, stomach, and further until he finds what he's looking for.  

   Loki shouts at the feel of Thor’s fingers pushing inside of him, a fleeting pain quickly replaced by an indelible need and both of them know this will not last long.  

   “Do it.” A command, Loki’s voice shredded with urgency.

   “Not yet, I might--” His jaw is suddenly clenched in Loki’s deceptively strong grasp and he’s yanked down a near inch from his brother’s face.

   “Now is not the time for you to start being _gentle_ with me.” He spits this at Thor, making him realize that Loki needs this to hurt just as much as he does. Letting his forehead drop onto Loki’s, he presses himself forward, past the near unyielding entrance and into a heat he was not ready for. He can only lay there, gasping, panting in his efforts to keep any semblance of control.

  He must see, he must-- levering himself up on his forearms, he’s held in place by what lies below him. Loki is matching his stillness, tracking Thor’s movements like prey. Slowly he brings a hand over Loki’s face, brushing back the hair that lay there before tracking down over his eyes, cheek, catching on his lips for the briefest--

   Loki snatches the hand away, bringing it down over his throat and pressing it closed around his windpipe.  Startled, Thor looks up, and the plea in Loki’s eyes sends a burning thrill through his veins. His hips rock forward, sharp and unrestrained, forcing a cry from Loki’s throat and Thor drives down to swallow it, everything of Loki’s now his.

   With another moan, Loki’s nails rake down Thor’s back and, thinking only in terms of blood for blood, he sinks his teeth into Loki’s neck. All of his brother pulls tight, sending a shockwave of heat up his spine. Thor buries his face in Loki’s shoulder to keep from roaring.  Static dampens the sound around him, satisfaction pooling in his toes. He is all warmth and wet, and it brings a smile to his lips that he can’t help but press into his brother’s skin.

   But Loki is already restless beneath him, squirming in his hold.  Thor releases a frustrated breath at his brother’s impatience, rolling off, but--in what he considers to be a very fair compromise-- pulling Loki with him until he’s resting atop Thor’s chest.  He relaxes a fraction, muscles not quite so whip tight and brings a hand to lay on Thor’s stomach. But it isn’t enough.

   “It is the only thing I truly hate about you while being forced to love it, for it is a part of you," there's a pause, both of them waiting to see where he will take this, "but why must you always leave?”

   Loki knows well what threatens to overtake him then, and blankets himself in his ever familiar cold before it can begin. What he cannot control is the hand he brings to Thor’s hair, gentle as the words he speaks. Gentler than he has likely ever been.

   “I am not at peace standing still.”

   “You are never at peace.”  

   “Yes, I am never at peace. Hear yourself Thor, you speak the reasons as clearly as I would.”

   “Would I not give you that? Could I not bring you peace?”

   “This is not about what you can and cannot give, for this is not about you.  It is who I am Thor. It is who I will always be.”

   “For someone who denied it so vehemently, you are _telling_ me I won’t survive you.” Disgust crosses Loki’s face at Thor’s words and he pushes up, off of Thor’s chest.

   “We will not do this again.”  His back is to Thor now, grabbing at his tattered garment before throwing it back on the floor when realizing the extent of its damage.

   “You’re punishing me.”

   “Do not be so childish. It is as you say, I am sparing you.”

   “You have a twisted sense of mercy.”  Thor is sitting up now, hands closed in fists over his knees so they won’t end up anywhere else.

   “As twisted as you think anything that does not go exactly the way you want it.”

   “So I’m back to the selfish brute now?  Really Loki, has this meant so little?”

   “Little enough that you still cannot see me.”  This hurts Thor, Loki does not need Thor’s reflection in the closet mirror, he feels it in the air.  The drop in pressure. The cool that follows betrayal.

    _“You are all I see.”_

   “No I am all you look at, you see nothing.”  

   “Then show me.” Frustration loses him his careful restraint and his hands close around Loki’s arms.

   “What more can I reveal?” Shrugging away from Thor’s touch, he moves up to the edge of the bed, looking down at him. “What more can I give, brother, before it becomes something else entirely in your hands?”

  “You speak as though you cannot be yourself with me, but you can.  You are! More yourself with me than anyone!” He moves next to Loki on the bed, and can’t help but feel like he’s chasing him. Again. And wasn’t that the point? But Loki’s head is in his hands, frustration laced through his back, his shoulders.

   “It is not different company I seek, you wonder why I think you narcissistic.”

   “Then _what_?”

   “Knowledge! And change, and life. For a start.” He gives his brother a pointed look.  “Mischief, as some might call it.”

   “And you cannot have that here?”

   “I cannot have it in one place.” He hesitates. “And you cannot move.”

   “Why?”

  “Because it is not in _your_ nature.  And I am not so cruel as to ask you to change.”

  “Would you want to?”  Never has he seen such pity in Loki’s eyes, something Loki would have punished him dearly for were their positions reversed.  Loki lets out a sigh, head shaking.

  “It does not matter what I would or would not, what I want or don’t.  This is how things are.”

   “It does not have to be, we could have more! _This_ defeat I will not accept so readily.”

   “My poor brother, this is not defeat.  It’s life. It does not always go the way we want it.”  Thor is lost at this, spoken as fact when he knows it to be choice.  “And I offered you more, you took it and now ask again. A dangerous precedent.”

   “You gave it to me so you could take it away, do not think me so naive.”  His brother was always underestimating him, always thinking him so easy. Loki’s back draws tight at Thor’s words and he pushes himself from the bed, pulling open the dresser for anything to cover himself.

   “You naive as I am cruel I suppose.  Well if that is my reasoning then it is a wonder you should want more of me.”  Rifling through the drawers, he gives up trying to find a t-shirt absent the Avengers symbol and pulls the next one he grabs over his head, turning around to face him.  At the look on Thor’s face he glances down and immediately rolls his eyes at what he sees. Mjolnir stretches wide across his front, a bold red script reading ‘Property of Thor’ stamped over it.

    Thor almost smiles, the moment so ridiculous, his reaction heartbreakingly familiar, but his expression snags when Loki sweeps his hair up into a small bun.  The movement is so unguarded, Loki standing there in nothing but one of Thor’s over sized shirts, hair pulled back to reveal the growing bruises on his neck, annoyance shifting his features into that familiar contemptuousness Thor has had to suffer his entire life.

   Loki stills under the weight of Thor’s stare, the change in the room. His expression turning to one of wariness, he opens his mouth to speak, but never gets the chance.  Thor has him by the waist before he can even register the movement, throwing him on the mattress with a yelp that has Thor beaming and Loki furious.

   “Get your hands off of me you oaf!” He’s shoving ineffectually at Thor’s chest, legs shifting hopelessly beneath him.

   “No.  No I am going to keep putting my hands on you.  For as long as you are here, as often as either of us likes.  And then when you leave I am going to miss you. It will hurt me, but it will not break me. For I will not feel pain for you being who you are.  I will not place that burden on you. And when you miss me-- which you will, you will miss me-- when that becomes too much for you, you will return to me and we will do it all again.”

  “So that I may take it away from you?”  It’s said with a grimace, bared teeth and malicious, and Thor’s grin softens.

  “That was unfair of me.  You know better than to think I meant it.”

  “I know better than to think you _understand_ half of what drops from that gaping void you call a mouth-- remove that expression from your face, or I shall remove it for you.”  Thor’s grin is back full force, everything he could ask for laying soft and ever so disgruntled beneath him. He leans down until his mouth is hovering just above Loki’s, breath all that would fit in the space between them.

  “And how would you propose to do that?” He’s shaking them both with his suppressed laughter, and cannot see, but feels Loki rolling his eyes again.

  “Norns save me from your sentimenta--”  Thor’s kissing him and it's nothing like their first.  Not gentle either, but as though they’ve done it a thousand times.  As though they have had this for as long as they should have, for as long as they’d wanted. As though they’ll have a thousand more.

  
  
  
  
  
  



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